A New Year Approaches

Hope everyone had a great and joyous day celebrating the birth of Jesus :-)

Just wondering what others are hoping the new year holds for you . . .

Christmas Season

It is once again the Christmas season.  What are your holiday traditions that help keep Christ prominent during the month of December?

I've started putting baby Jesus from our nativity in the last advent box and having our presents opened by Christmas eve so that when Christmas day arrives we are focusing on Jesus with the boys and not tearing into gifts.

Happy Thanksgiving

Wishing everyone a wonderful day as we thank God for all the blessings he's given us this past year!

Fear & Identity

I came across a blog post that really fit with what we are talking about in What Women Fear right now. The post is about success & failure written by a pastor who is in the middle of a giving campaign. He gets asked the question, "Will you feel like a failure if you don't raise the money?". His answer is that if he doesn't raise the money he will be disappointed, but he won't feel like a failure. He talks about how he knows what it is like to feel failure since he has made some huge failures in his life. Then he goes on to say this--"What causes us to feel like a success or failure always determines where we find our identity". That really hit me. When I flip it around and think about the times I have felt like a failure I can figure out where I have placed my identity. If I'm honest only some of my feelings of failure come from feeling like I have let down God. There are quite a lot of times when I feel like a failure that don't really have God in the picture at all. Maybe if I think about this idea when I'm worried (or even excited) I can think about whether my fear (or excitement) has roots in my identity being in the wrong place.

Here's the blog post: http://refineus.org/2011/10/will-you-feel-like-a-failure/

Restoration

Yesterday's sermon from Pastor Davey really spoke to me.  As Christians, we are all often in danger of wandering a bit.  If we become complacent or even just let little things slide for a bit, we can find ourselves drifting far off before we even know.  I know I do this so often and it is so hard to get back to where I was before I slacked off.  We are challenged to be steadfast and to help those we also see wandering.

Let God hear our confessed sins daily so that he may cover our multitude of sins and to our spiritual communion with God to be restored and to flourish.  Be encouraged and know that we are here to support one another and to lift each other up when we struggle.

"My brothers, if one of you should wander from the truth and someone should bring him back, remember this: Whoever turns a sinner from the error of his way will save him from death and cover over a multitude of sins."
                          James 5:19-20

And on a side note, if you want a laugh, go to Colonial's homepage and check out the video of the deer running through the halls of church.  Have a blessed day gals!

Congrats

For new life, we are so thankful.  Welcome Samuel Charles Crossland!  We can't wait for your playmates to make their appearance this summer and fall.

For new adventures, we are so excited.  Erika and Ashley with weddings in their future.  Sarah, Kate, and Kate going back to school!

Happy Thursday!

Just want to send my love and encouragement out to everyone today!!!  You gals are on my mind and heart!  May God bless each of you this week.

Putting thoughts out there

Reading the Bible the way we are has some interesting results.  I really like how the last few days some of the feasts and offerings being explained and implemented in Numbers are being continued and Jesus participating in them in Luke.  

I also really enjoyed todays Psalm.  I loved the repetition.  It is one that feels more like a song rather than a poem.  

He alone is my rock and my salvation,

my fortress where I will never be shaken.

        Psalm 62:2 (also verse 6)

Daylight Savings Time

I wore black today.  I was in mourning for the lost hour of sleep (more than one to be honest, but that was thanks to a child not spring forward).  I was teaching Sunday School at the 8:00 hour so it was already an early morning for me.  In all this selfishness and whining, God provided a really great reminder with the lesson I was teaching.  


LOVE GOD BEST!


Love the Lord with all your heart with all your soul and all your mind.  Matthew 22:37

What's Your Favorite Verse or Passage?

As I'm reading in the bible in a year, I continue to be struck by the passages that the publisher/editor chose to bold and highlight.  It made me think about which verse/section I would highlight.  So my challenge is for each of us to think about it and comment with our favorite verse or passage.

Fun Thought on a Friday

After the last few days with the skin diseases and purifications, a funny thought struck me for some of the earlier readings this week in Leviticus.  God is the creator of all things, including fat-free diets :-)

He is an awesome God!

Have a great Friday everyone!

Tabernacle and offerings

As I have been reading the specifications of the building of the Tabernacle and now reading about the regulations for the offerings in Exodus and Leviticus, I have wondered why such precise instructions were given. I'm sure that God had a reason behind His directness. I am thinking that He knew His people's hearts and knew that they needed it spelled out (just like I do sometimes). What do you all think?

More than enough

In the Feb 13 reading of Exodus, Moses stopped taking donations for the tabernacle once the church had enough to do the work The Lord set out for them. From the ESV:

⁶So Moses gave command, and word was proclaimed throughout the camp, "Let no man or woman do anything more for the contribution for the sanctuary." So the people were restrained from bringing, ⁷for the material they had was sufficient to do all the work, and more.


Amazing!

1. In the earlier verses, there is no tithe or amount of giving required, the offerings were made by "everyone who was willing and whose heart moved him." It's pretty incredible that without even being really asked or reminded, the people give so abundantly that there is more than enough to get this huge feat accomplished for The Lord! As Piper encouraged us in Desiring God, that is how our giving should be. From the heart, without obligation, abundant.

2. Moses instructs the people to stop giving, in spite of what that could have meant for him or the tabernacle. Why not let them continue to give? He or the church would have multiplied their wealth in the receipt of additional gold, silver, precious stones, fine fabrics.
I believe he was building the tabernacle to follow God's commands only and not about to turn this Christian operation into a secular one! He also evidently had faith, as we should, that God will provide for His work to be done. If this task was the extent to which he knew God's plans, he would not collect beyond what was needed for those plans.

Are we, in our churches and personal lives, ceasing collection once we have enough or more than enough to do God's work? That's the only thing we are here for after all!

PS- If anyone is behind on the daily reading, I encourage them to play catch up in this way so we can all stay in sync- I'm still doing the daily reading for the current date, but I have a bookmark if I miss a day to go back and read it. This is helping me not give up when I get behind also :)

Encouragement

I just wanted to send out some encouragement to everyone.  It is hard to keep up with our good intentions from the first day of an activity, whatever it is.  It is hard to stick with reading the bible everyday, doing all parts of our bible studies, sometimes even just getting out of bed in the morning.  I know we can do it, though.  God will help us through.

I was walking through my kitchen and a favorite "life reminder" someone gave me is a picture of a dragon using a lance as his toothpick.  It says, "No matter how hard you fight, no matter how right you are . . . sometimes the dragon wins."  I realized while that may be true and a good reminder that life won't always go the way I want it to, God will always triumph over all things and that is comforting.

Have a great day everyone!

"You have turned my mourning into joyful dancing.  You have taken away my clothes of mourning and clothed me with joy, that I might sing praises to you and not be silent.  O Lord my God, I will give you thanks forever!"   Psalm 30:11-12

Truth

I love you, Lord;

you are my strength.

The Lord is my rock, my fortress,

and my savior;

my God is my rock, in whom

I find protection.

He is my shield, the power that saves me;

and my place of safety.

   Psalm 18:1-2

It has to be said

It was a section I was dreading.  Yes, I am talking of yesterday's reading in Genesis, a set of the "begats".  And sure enough, it put me to sleep.  I started in the morning, but couldn't keep my eyes open through it.  After hanging with Mike and the boys, I finally finished yesterday's bible reading just before going to sleep.
Anyone else have a section that they have to struggle through?

Biting my Tongue

James 3: 1 "Not many of you should presume to be teachers, my brothers, because you know that we who teach will be judged more strictly."

Whoa-press the pause button. The pause button on life for just one moment. How convicting is this verse? Yes, Pastor Davey defined teachers as those who teach the word and biblical truths, but as he ran through the list: Sunday school teachers, pastors, etc...I couldn't help but be convicted with how influential our roles are as teachers. Yes, public school teachers. The performance review my principal provides this year will not hold a candle to His performance review. Now I know that I don't explicitly teach the word as I do in Sunday School to my fourth graders. But I certainly model it. I share it through my actions, tone, facial expressions, speech, and thoughts while on the ol' job clock.

I kept thinking about Katie Nam. Bless her heart, while she is a space cadet most of the time, I need to remember her heart. I had a conference with her Mom last week who informed me that Katie was having a hard time handling her groupmates. She doesn't have temper tantrums as another of my children have, but I could see how teasing and playfulness that goes back and forth between her groupmates could be frustrating for Katie. Apparently she bottles it up inside and bursts into tears when she gets home. Mom asked her if she tells me at all, but she says "Miss Kenyon says she doesn't care..."

EE!! The thing is, I have said that before. She is right! I have said those exact words in an effort to brush off what I consider trivial matters for what I deem more important (keeping the schedule, teaching the lesson, managing the whole group)...what have I done?! I have placed my agenda above her heart and feelings. I have ignored my duty as a Christian to shine the light in these little lives. I minimalized the importance of her feelings for matters of the world. I have forgotten that my definition of what is trivial and significant as an adult is not the same as a child's definition.

Pray that I can humble myself and govern my tongue. Pray that I can make decisions in my classroom not because of a focus on a pacing guide or a pending EOG, but rather, because of my focus on Heaven above.

Amen that Jesus eats with the sinners like me (Mt 9:9-13)...What joy I find in that Jesus says himself: "For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners."

Side note on teaching the Aphids--- Moses hearing God speak from the burning bush is not an easy concept to explain to four year olds. Especially when I had just left a sermon on teaching the Word. I had to get it right, didn't want to teach it incorrectly!

They couldn't fathom how God was not in the bush. Bless their little hearts, they kept saying "I see Him in the picture...Look! There He is!" Me: "No, you can't see Him. He is there but shows Himself to Moses with His voice. " 4year old: "Yes, he is right there!" Me: "See God is in Heaven, but He is in the bush but only with His voice." 4 year old dead serious and astonished: "Wow, and that (heaven) is real high up there." Me: "Yes, it is amazing how far He could travel."

Have a fabulous week ladies!
KK

God-incident

So I love it when this happens!
Yesterday's reading included Matthew 7:15-29. Today I get the mail and what is in there? A sermon covering Matthew 7:15-29.
A close friend of the family actually sent a CD of this message to me along with a Bible study book that she just completed that had made her think of Keith and I often.
The sermon was from one of the many churches around my home town that had been praying for us during and after Lincoln's life. He used Keith and I as an illustration and actually read the last of my emails about Lincoln, which was quite convicting yet oddly encouraging.

Convicting because, yes, we do strive to build our house on the rock of Jesus but we are in no way "there." Also, it made me look again at where I am now. Am I still living on the rock? Have I perhaps let back in some worldly worries and concerns that in the middle of the toughest part I had given completely and totally to God?
This past month I have had some tough times, and some really selfish thoughts and actions where I have lived as though I am in charge. I have been planning things out, counting days, budgeting, looking ahead to worldly things- not to heavenly things.
Our service at Colonial convicted me of this as well (all 3 times I heard it- yay orchestra!) just to be still and listen to what the Lord is trying to tell me.
I have been convicted to continue to live totally on the rock of Jesus, and as Emily said- quit trying to "help" God out with his plan.

This was also encouraging. I don't know who was there that morning, or who was touched by our testimony of faith. But chances are that someone was, and that means that God has already used Lincoln's life. I got to see one tiny part of what could be possible.
The other encouraging part is the incredible timing of our Lord. Of course I would get this in the mail the day after we read that section of scripture. :)
Just thought I would share!
See you tomorrow, if we can make it to Carly's in the ice and snow!

Curing Cynicism in Prayer

Hey my fave ladies :-)

So as I was catching up on my Desiring God Blog (one of the ministries of Bethlehem - Piper's church) I read this excerpt from Paul Miller on cynicism in prayer....an eye-opener for me...

Cynicism is my biggest struggle in prayer. It is a quiet, cold rationalism that dulls the soul and just kills your walk with God. It is hard to even identify or name our cynicism because it just feels like being realistic. It says things like, “What good does it [prayer] do?” or “It [the answer to prayer] would have happened anyway.”

I think we are particularly susceptible to cynicism in the Reformed world because we are an intellectual world. We are rightly concerned about our ideas being correct, but we don’t always pay attention to our heart being correct.

I think without a doubt that the principal cure for cynicism is to become a little child and learn to cry out for help—to realize that I am a lost coin, a lost sheep, and a lost son.

One other cure for cynicism is purity of life. Any time there is a miss between how we present ourselves as Christians and what we are really like when no one is watching, that opens up a door for cynicism. So a lifestyle of repentance and confession goes a long way to cure cynicism.

See you all on Tuesday!

Day 7-Backfire

As I was reading Genesis this morning, I thought back to our discussion on Tuesday night about submitting to God's will.  It's hard and it's even harder to be patient to wait and see God's will for us.  For Abraham, who was even told what God's will was for him, he and Sarah tried to make God's will happen in their own way since they just couldn't wait.  (Ch 16).  Instead it backfired, Hagar bore the father of strife with Israel and treated Sarah with contempt.  Sarah's response was harsh treatment of Hagar and still more disbelief 13 years later (Ch 18) when the Lord told them that within the year Isaac would be born.

I want to say how amazingly insane it seems that they were told God's plan and couldn't wait, but I can't.  We want so badly to help God along that we make such huge blunders that backfire on us instead.  God doesn't need our help.  As he says in Gen. 18: 14a "Is anything too hard for the Lord?"  I just hope the lessons sticks with me next time I try to "help" God out in my life!

Day 4 - Genesis & the flood

Something I thought was interesting today was verse 8:21 where God says "I will never again curse the ground because of the human race, even though everything they think or imagine is bent toward evil from childhood." It makes wonder...suppose God had not promised us this, and given the current status of the world we live in, how close would He be, today, to flooding the Earth again? Also, I wonder just how wicked must they have been in the beginning to deserve this?
...just some things to think over :)
Another reference is Genesis 6:5-8, where God explains his reasoning for the flood.

I've missed you guys!! Can't wait to see you tonight!

Celebrating Tuesday

Just finished reading this week's chapter on prayer.  I can't wait to be back together and discuss a healthy prayer life with Jesus.  One thing really stuck with me that somewhat went back to a discussion we had a few weeks ago.  It refers to one of the ways our God is different from the dead gods the world worships.  God wants to serve us and give us hope, there is nothing but his glorification that he wants from us while the other gods seek service that can never be complete or fulfilling to a person.

Looking forward to 2011 with the Baker's Dozen and an awesome discussion tonight.

Day 1 - Genesis

When reading from Genesis today, I realized that in 1:27 the Bible says that "God created human beings," but it isn't until 2:7 that "God formed the man from the dust of the ground." Am I missing something here? It does also say in 2:7 that "He breathed the breath of life into the man's nostrils, and the man became a living person." So, I'm thinking that He created man, but without life, and then He gave him life? Interesting. Weigh in!